Chat with Shailesh Naik, Head – ITC e-Choupal divison

Q. What were the challenges and hurdles that you faced in the last mile, basically if one looks at the rural population?

The rural market construct is very fragmented and heterogeneous and has pretty bad connectivity. The first hurdle I think was lack of proper infrastructure; be it in terms of physical infrastructure or human infrastructure. People were not trained enough to do the several elements of the task which were there. So there was a lot of capability building required. This was also essential because we were trying to change the trade structure itself. The initial trade structure was that the farmer had to come to the mandi. We wanted to change it to a structure where the farmer was educated in the village itself. So there was a huge change which we wanted to bring both in terms of the information infrastructure as well as the human infrastructure. So at that particular point of time we had to innovate.

Luckily at the same time, internet revolution also happened and so we leveraged and started the e-Choupal as a model to make our information dissemination much better. That was our first level.

But as the times changed our challenges also changed. The roads infrastructure in the last nine years has been much better, connectivity has improved, mobile connectivity has improved, and increased television penetration has helped people become more media literate. Their literacy has helped them to be much more informed decision-makers. In that case, now the new challenges are how you keep on updating our model so that the relevancy remains.

As of now, e-Choupal, has become the largest initiative among all Internet based interventions in rural India. E-Choupal services today reach out to over four million farmers growing a range of crops.

Q. How did you go about creating physical infrastructure in terms of computer system, electricity, internet connection, etc?

We started basically with V-SAT as an option because there were no fiber cables or cables to really connect through. So V-SAT was the only option at that particular point of time. As power spikes were very high in rural India, we had to make a separate kind of UPS, unlike the city UPS, which had a certain load level that it can bear. A city UPS would immediately conk off within one spike which is there in rural India voltage fluctuations. This particular UPS was costing nearly four times than what an urban UPS was costing. But then that was a necessary investment for the computer health and was designed along with one of our network partners.

Similarly we had solar cells which were there to give power for a longer period. Luckily in rural India because there are no tall buildings and you get sunlight across the day that helped them in operating the computer for a longer period of time. These were the two interventions that were done both on the electricity front and also on the voltage fluctuation front.

Now we can say that e-Choupal leverages information technology to virtually cluster all the value chain participants, delivering the same benefits as vertical integration does in mature agricultural economies

Q. What’s next for ITC e-Choupal?

ITC’s strategic intent is to develop e-Choupal as a significant two way multidimensional delivery channel, efficiently carrying goods and services out of and into rural India. By progressively linking the digital infrastructure to a physical network of rural business hubs and agro-extension services, ITC is transforming the way farmers do business, and the way rural markets work.

E-Choupal will continue to provide the farmers of India all the information, products and services they need to enhance farm productivity, improve farm-gate price realisation and cut transaction costs. E-Choupal has also started providing information on other farm related activities like, weather forecasts, the latest farming techniques, crop insurance etc.

Also, going beyond farm related activities, ITC, with one of the network partners, has started providing information on employment (rozgar duniya) for the rural people. With increasing mobile subscribers, we are testing the model in which we will provide the information through mobiles.

All the innovations and initiatives, at ITC’s e-Choupal will be guided by the motive of empowering rural India by providing the power of relevant knowledge.

Q. How do you foresee the role of IT in reaching out to the Bottom of Pyramid?

Information Technology can play a great role in connecting rural masses to the rest of the world. But the role of IT, as I foresee, would be more of a facilitator. IT can improve the efficiency or the productivity but there has to be a business model around it.

Also, a human touch is definitely required. This is particularly with reference to India. Priority sectors like, education, healthcare can make great changes with IT as an enabler. So IT has to work with other sectors to uplift the people at the bottom of the pyramid.

Views are personal